Funeral Oration of Pericles Essay

In the reading of the Funeral Oration of Pericles, I do not believe what Pericles says about Athens. I believe he made his speech to boost morale for his people and for the soldiers, and to keep the war going. In the Funeral Oration of Pericles, they were there to honor the fallen soldiers and to have a burial for them, but Pericles made it about the war. He used it to boost morale for the soldiers, to get them excited and to give them a reason to keep fighting, he also used it to give a reason behind the war to the citizens. It was a political move on its own. These tactics are still used in the world today, such as the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and as far back as the Gettysburg Address. Pericles believed that personal glory was one of the rare things you could have, and fighting in the war and giving your life for your city was one of the highest glories you could bestow, so therefore he glorified the war not the people that lost their lives fighting in it. Pericles was trying to persuade the people that the war was worth people losing their lives over and that there was a meaning and cause for it. The funeral oration can be seen in the world today with the war in Iraq, where the President gives the speeches about why we are fighting in a war, the reasons and the cause, which is really not known today, such as weapons of mass destruction, it was said that Iraq possessed these and come to find out they had none, so many people lost their lives for what reason? There was hype, and glorification given to the men and women that fought, to boost their morale and for them to know they were doing something that helped the country. The President tried to persuade the citizens with his speeches that it was just and there was a reason for the war. In conclusion, the question asked was do I believe everything Pericles says about Athens in the Funeral Oration. The answer to that would be no. I do not believe that Pericles was there to honor the fallen soldiers. I belie ve he was there to persuade the citizens and the soldiers that what they were doing was right and was just and if they continued then they would be glorified.

CURRENT ISSUES IN FINANCIAL REPORTING Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words - 4

CURRENT ISSUES IN FINANCIAL REPORTING - Essay Example Off-balance-sheet-financing is that debt that is not usually reported on a company’s balance sheet. The formal distinction between off and on-balance sheet items present some complications that are usually subject to some level of judgment by management. However, the primary distinction between the off and on-balance sheet items is based on whether or not a business/company owns or is legally responsible for that debt. Additionally, uncertain liabilities or assets are subject to being grouped as ‘probable’, ‘meaningful’ and ‘measurable’. Some of the examples of the off-balance sheet items include; unconsolidated subsidiaries, operating leases, financial instruments such as hedging contracts and derivatives securities, contingent assets/liabilities among many others (Bauman, 2003). Financial statements need to be adjusted from time to time so that they are able to reflect the economic substance of the information they represent. Companies should, therefore, focus on accounting methods that emphasis on economic substance by considering changes in accounting policies. Economic substance is a transaction that has a purpose besides reducing tax liability. Conversely, Sally and Schreiber states that, â€Å"The economic substance doctrine is a common law judicial doctrine that disallows tax benefits of a transaction if the transaction lacks economic substance or a business purpose.† Therefore, transactions and events should be accounted for in a manner that faithfully represents their true economic substance and not the mere legal form. The off-balance sheet items; thus, provide a reason financial statements often fail to faithfully represent the economic substance. Off-balance sheet activities usually do not represent the true picture of a net worth of a firm. This is because firms do not include market values of their off balance sheet items. Furthermore, the transparency of off balance sheet activities are

Advanced Accounting Theory and Practice-Corporate social Coursework

Advanced Accounting Theory and Practice-Corporate social responsibilityCSRtheories - Coursework Example Starbuck engages in CSR due to its continuing commitment to help them contribute to economic development by being responsible to their respective stakeholders (Hancock, 2005, 12). The stakeholder theory maintains that a company should adopt policies that aim at satisfying numerous stakeholders because they are able to affect or are affected by the achievement of the company’s objectives. This theory regards the meaning of good management and how each individual can create value for each other. Starbuck’s involvement in CSR will help in the development of real opportunities for growth. By committing a responsible investment on the sector of the economy, the company is enhancing the social welfare of their stakeholders thereby resulting to economic growth thus enhancing the living standards of the stakeholders (Mullerat & Brennan, 2011, 89). According to integrative theories, a company should engage in CRS in order to integrate demand and concerns by their stakeholders and society because they depend on the society as well as the stakeholders for existence, continuity and growth. A CSR program will help Starbuck in recruiting and retaining employees because potential recruits the competitive graduate student market especially, often look at CSR policies of a company. CSR, therefore, delivers a much more positive perception of Starbuck among its workforce, particularly when they are involved through payroll giving fundraising or community volunteering activities (Hancock, 2005, 15). A company should take into consideration the social or stakeholder demand and integrate them in such a manner that they operate according to social norms and values. This is clearly spelt out by legitimacy theory. The theory states that a firm should operate within rules, norms and beliefs of their respective societies, and this is the reason why Starbuck has decided to pay tax on their British sales which they have been avoiding. They have received a legitimacy threat by

The Volcker Rule and its Consequences for the Financial and Banking Essay

The Volcker Rule and its Consequences for the Financial and Banking System - Essay Example Federal Reserve has publicly announced that the banking system of US does not need to accept and operate according to the rule before the month of July of 2014 but the banks will have to conduct the process of â€Å"good faith planning efforts† to get ready to accept the rule in the future and during the temporary phase. As banks and the financial system is still not aware of the bans that will be levied, there will be a cloud of uncertainty that these systems will experience for two years (Ciro 2012). These systems are experiencing ambiguity in understanding what does the Federal Reserve means by good faith planning efforts. The ambiguities are making condition worse thus decision makers should make the scenario clear and present the effects of the rule on US and other nations. The cloudy situation was made clear when a draft of the regulation was prepared and this draft consisted of details regarding the services offered by financial system and the way these services are use d by the common public. The situation is still quite unclear for financial institutions as even the draft wasn’t clear enough to identify the effects that the rule will have on financial sector. The European Union and other countries have even showed concerns as they expect that the rule will decrease the liquidity in world financial markets, thus it is quite clear that the rule will impact the financial systems negatively. Body The delay in implementing and clearing the effect of the rule may not help the banks and make situation worse as banks do not have the correct idea of when the rule will be implemented and banks will have to accept the rule legally regardless of whether they understand its effect or not. Legally it is stated that those banks that have operated in good faith effort during the temporary implementation phase will experience less problems in complying with the actual rule. The policy makers should make the scenario clearer instead of making the financial system of US and overseas operate according to their own guess work. The delay is making the financial system take decisions under ambiguous situation which is already hurting the system. Volcker Permitted Bank Activities According to the rule there are certain permitted activities that can be performed by the banks, these activities comprise of banks acting as market maker, underwriter, hedger, deals of government securities and other activities that are stated under the act as permitted activities. These activities have been permitted to ensure that banks continue to provide liquidity to the markets and help companies in raising capital. But these activities have been restricted to ensure that banks do not cross the line and the funds with the bank do not become unsafe. If the permitted activities cannot be conducted in a safe environment and without risky conditions, then the federal system has the right to barge banks from conducting such activities or increase charges and fines on these activities so these activities become unfavourable to the banks. The activities that have been stated as acceptable in the rule are done on the basis that the bank conducts these activities for the customer and only to meet the short term demands of the customers. Rule Effect The Volcker Rule has received its name from the Paul Volcker who was the Federal Reserve Chairman during the period of the financial crises of 2008. The

How can interactive media encourage students from secondary schools to Dissertation - 1

How can interactive media encourage students from secondary schools to eat healthy and thus contribute to reducing the growing o - Dissertation Example The present time reflects examples of advertising that make use of the persuasive technology with advertisers using words like ‘free’ and ‘hurry’ offering them with bargains on different products and services, and attracting greater number of consumers. This is reflected in the world of internet advertising as well. With the use of different software and applications, behavior and attitude of people are being altered. Such apps include financial apps or healthcare apps as well, thereby strongly communicating their messages to the people, and proving that web sites have become the most influential persuasive technology of the present times (Tittel, 2013). Beyond the web there are other persuasive technologies that have developed and become highly effective in the present day world. This includes the use of the mobile phones that has been obtained to have significant positive effects on persuading people towards better healthcare. Over the past few years, mobi le devices have been largely used for persuasion along with bringing together government agencies, academics, as well as health care organizations belonging to the private sector, for persuading people towards better healthcare. SMS services are used for promotion of healthcare trying to persuade people to change their attitudes and behavior towards how they maintain their health. This is also possible through the use of other media like the television, radio, and other forms of communications that people in general follow in the present times (Mobile Health, 2010). Considering contemporary examples of persuasive technologies beyond the web, such as mobile devices and hence SMS services have been mentioned earlier, and other communications media like television and radio (Mobile Health, 2010), the expansion and use of the persuasive technologies have been found in marketing of businesses, in environment, in education, and in health care. Use of body-wearable sensors, technologies th at are aware of contexts and real time information exchange are what makes up the persuasive technologies of the recent times involving devices like the mobile phones and other communicative devices (Chatterjee, 2009). 2. Advantages of Persuasive Technology Over Traditional Media and People: The emergence of persuasive technologies through the use of computers, web, and other devices has offered certain advantages over the traditional media and people. These include that it is more persistent than the human beings. It offers significant ambiguity. It has the capability to manage huge amounts of information. It can make use of several modalities to influence people. It can scale with ease. Also, persuasive technologies can be taken to places where it is not possible for human beings to reach. For example, Amazon.com offers books to its customers and along with that it suggests its customers for books through different links thus allowing customers to know about books that they otherw ise never knew (Drew, 2011). The development of information and communications technology has led to greater advantages of persuasion than the traditional media and people, with such revised development being more and more demanded. The present day persuasive

Environmental Studies Class Journal Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Environmental Studies Class Journal - Case Study Example It would be helpful if we could shut down some of the less efficient plants, even if we can't close all of them. Natural gas is one of the state's largest source of energy and only 10% of the state's energy comes from renewables, mostly geothermals followed by biomass, wind, and solar. Economic analyses are decision-making tools for energy projects and techniques to choose among a number of different options. They do not include the benefit to the environment, the benefit to society, or whether you're being a good neighbor. Objectives for this unit are to understand that these analyses can range from simple to complex, be able to review and understand assumptions, be familiar with the limits, and be able to run through example calculations. Types of economic analyses include rough order of magnitude estimates for budget purposes (ROM), Simple payback, and Internal rate of return (IRR). These are used both on new building projects and retrofits. Investment decision types involved in a nalyses include to accept or reject a single project or system operation, to select an optimal efficiency level for a building system, select an optimal system type from competing alternatives, select an optimal combination of interdependent systems, and/or rank competing projects to allocate a limited budget. Assumptions are everything. They define the project and state the objectives, they establish first cost, cost of energy, cost of labor and materials, cost of maintenance, cost of money, tax credits, and inflation. You need to know where they came from, which ones are solid as compared to guesses, and how to adjust when solid numbers are available. To get an idea of how to do this, we looked at the simple payback analysis. The equation is simple payback (in years) = cost divided by savings where the cost is the cost of the project in dollars and the savings are annual energy savings in dollars. In comparing options, you subtract the cost of one benefit over the other. For cost, you should list the assumptions and the sources you used to reach that number, then use the cost difference between the different options. Do the same thing for savings, convert all units to dollars per year. We looked at a refrigerator analysis as an example in which the simple payback was about one and a half years. Then we looked at the example of a water heater which included more complex variables. These two examples really helped demonstrate the important role played by the assumptions that effects the overall solution. The example with the compact fluorescent bulbs showed how to use the spreadsheet program to help us work out the details and allows us to change the variables when we need to, for example if an assumption has changed. After the break, we looked at an online tool that would do these analyses which showed why it's important for us to be able to check these figures for ourselves and then moved on to talk about energy action plans. The second half of class looked at an energy action plan. This was accomplished by looking at the specific example of Stanford University. He talked about the importance of knowing the location, getting management interested, getting the users involved, the maintenance people involved, and performing the energy audit from a variety of perspectives. Things that were important in this section were involving maintenance, the design team, the issue of capital improvement, non-stop measurement,

The Tempest Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

The Tempest - Research Paper Example Motifs, therefore, help Shakespeare bring out the veracious analogies underlying in his text. The tempest that occurs at the beginning of the paly symbolizes notable things. To begin with, it highlights the conflicts occurring between the characters in the boat. This, especially, is crucial in the context of a wedding and a serene sea that may not promise an underlying tension. The tempest warns the audience that the characters in the boat have unresolved differences. It is essential to note that the storm places Prospero’s enemies at a vulnerable position, whereby he can exploit them for his own ends. This symbolizes his earlier suffering and struggle. Just as Prospero suffered in the sea some years ago, he places the victims of the shipwreck at the mercy of the sea. The audience later uncovers that the storm is not a natural occurrence as it had been caused by Prospero. A malicious aspect of magic warns the audience of the danger of dalliance with a mystical world. Prospero, however, is careful and conscientious enough to only use magic as a means of punishment, but not as a way of obliterating his enemies. This is because the storm does not cause any harm. In a large sense, the tempest reveals a noble and benevolent character of Prospero that seeks to realign the society towards normalcy. More essentially, the tempest represents a social upheaval that upsets the status of the privileged class in the society. The storm sets the Shakespearean society for a more egalitarian mode of life that respects the dignity of the person. When the characters suffer from the shipwreck, it manifests that death is a unifying factor that does not favor a person, regardless of one’s societal status. Shakespeare, in the character of Prospero, is an idealist who detests the feudal systems that place a certain class of individuals above others. He, therefore, see ks to reveal the meaninglessness of royal titles in life. Music is also an important motif